Ok, this is really ticking me off...
I have the following kernels on my system:
2.4.23 (kernel.org) 2.4.24 (kernel.org) 2.6.2 (kernel.org) 2.6.2-rc3-love (ebuild) mm-sources-2.6.3_rc1-r1 (ebuild)
I have these options enabled/disabled in my kernel (the things that I would imagine, would make you system slower or faster).. (also this setup is currently with 2.6.2-rc3-love) ...(though it is pretty much the same with all the other kernels also)
[*] Symmetric multi-processing support < just to see (tried this just once this time ... made no difference.. maybe made my kernel size bigger)
[*] SMT (Hyperthreading) scheduler support
[*] Preemptible Kernel
[*] Machine Check Exception
[*] MTRR (Memory Type Range Register) support
[*] Power Management support [*] Software Suspend (EXPERIMENTAL)
[*] ACPI Support < taking this out actually made my system slower!
<M> APM (Advanced Power Management) BIOS support
I have compiled these kernels over and over again.. and still have not gotten and performance gains.. Having taken all ACPI and APM.. anything to do with power management totally out.
glxgears, Quake 3, hdparm all run the same.. if not slower than using a 2.4.X kernel.
Now most would say.. "Well, if 2.4.X works so well, why dont you just use that?"
My reply of course is.. "Because everyone I have come across so far that is using a 2.6.X kernel has said how super bad, and faster their boxes are.. so responsive.. so awesome.." GRRR!!! (@*#&%(@#*&R%
I think it is complete B.S.!
in my /etc/lilo.conf I have:
append="elevator=cfq"
Below, dmesg shows it loading:
Kernel command line: BOOT_IMAGE=Gentoo-Love ro root=302 elevator=cfq
going without that append, does nothing either.. turned on, turned off.. hmm... that is the question!
I am on a Dell Inspiron 8500 laptop, so I think I need ACPI and stuff... and once again, I must point out that turning off ACPI in the kernel, actually made MY system SLOWER! (hdparm's output actually dropped by 150MB/sec)
Here is my /etc/fstab: (in case that makes a difference)
/dev/hda2 / ext3 defaults 1 1 /dev/hda6 /usr ext3 defaults 1 1 /dev/hda5 none swap defaults 0 0 /dev/sr0 /mnt/cdrw iso9660 user,rw 0 0 none /proc proc defaults 0 0 none /proc/bus/usb usbfs defaults 0 0 none /dev/shm tmpfs defaults 0 0
Maybe I have ext3 configured wrong.. or something turned on like debugging or whatever, that is keeping my system from going any faster.
But I use reiserfs on some boxes.. and it does not make a difference in speed.
When I am doing anything like downloading a large file, or emerging/compiling/installing a program.. even if my cpu does not max out @ 100%, I still get a laggy box.. mouse moves jerky, slow.. typing in xchat-2 is painfully slow... (type words.. wait a few seconds.. see output).. not all the time.. but even once makes me grimace.
I am also using:
Fluxbox 0.9.6pre xfree 4.3.0-r3 NVIDIA 5336
When X loads I usually (well always..) have these programs running:
X fluxbox lineakd xchat-2 gaim Eterm -x 3 Thunderbird MozillaFirebird gkrellm2 klipper
top shows,(pretty average for me):
75 Total process, 1 running 74 sleeping
load average: 0.01, 0.08, 0.10
My hdparm switches are:
hdparm -d1 -A1 -m16 -u1 -a64 /dev/hda
My hdd is an ATA-100 / 7200 rpm hdd.
A quick look at the supported settings for my hdd using hdparm show that I can enable all the commands to make it faster.
The settings are:
/dev/hda: multcount = 16 (on) IO_support = 0 (default 16-bit) unmaskirq = 1 (on) using_dma = 1 (on) keepsettings = 0 (off) readonly = 0 (off) readahead = 64 (on) geometry = 65535/16/63, sectors = 117210240, start = 0
I have set "readahead" up to 256 .. still no improvement on "hdparm -tT /dev/hda"
I really cant think of anything else to show to help someone.. anyone help me figure this out.
I have used kernels from both gentoo and kernel.org with the same results.
I even sent someone my lspci -v output and let them make a .config for my 2.6.2 kernel.. (in case my 7 years of Linux experience has somehow made me stupider..as it sure hasnt helped me to spell!).. anyhow.. no improvement.. same results.
I dont think this is my laptop doing this to me.. as I have 7 other Gentoo Linux boxes all running the love kernel too, or a gentoo 2.6.2 kernel, and in 1 case a kernel.org 2.6.2 kernel. (just as slow..)
It has been said, that maybe I already have my box so tweaked out that I wont see a difference anymore, that I have gone as fast as I can possibly go.
Searching forums.gentoo.org for "hdparm" I found that quite a lot of people finding hdparm for the first time, are ecstatic over the fact that they have scores of 200MB/sec! (While I am upset I am not getting over 700MB/sec)
I have talked to people who have used ntpl and udev and they have said they had what they thought was a little improvement.. I.E. X starting a little faster.. etc.. etc.. but no-one has convinced me that it is actually worth upgrading to yet.
So anyways.. go figure..
Who can help me?
Because I sure am sick of hearing about the great improvements of 2.6.X based kernels.. and even more sick of reading comments on the love-sources kernel.. that is supposed to kick a regular 2.6.X kernel's ass! LIARS! I say.
What kind of machines are these people running? I cant imagine being slower than what I have now.. it must suck for people who actually are running slower. Damn!
Thank you
Sincerely,
TriKster Abacus irc.freenode.net #cllug #gentoo #linuxfriends irc.cotse.com #linux http://www.cllug.org http://www.trikster.homelinux.org http://www.trikster.homelinux.org/contact.html
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